Talking Cigarette Packs May Scare You Into Quitting Smoking

Scotland’s University of Stirling is working on a rather novel way to help people to kick their nicotine habits: it’s developing packs of cigarettes that play recorded messages warning smokers about the dangers of lighting up.

The packs use technology that’s already been applied to birthday cards that play music when they’re opened, except whereas those cards usually feature something hokey like 'For He's a Jolly Good Fellow,' these special cigarette packs come with some stuffy British lad reminding us that puffing away could result in a hole in our throats with a voice that will scare kids for years to come.

The packs have gotten a positive response on test subjects so far, with some volunteers saying they could be effective because they might be enticed to quit simply to stop hearing the annoying messages (If that's the case, perhaps they could develop the capability to get people's mothers-in-law to be the voice -- smokers may quit in record time).